No amount of good advertising can sell a bad product

In an age of pervasive sensationalized reportage, celebrity flash, tight competition, and expanding media forms, the issue of style over substance has never been more pronounced. Substance is great, but style is what sells. The steak is sumptuous, but the sizzle is what attracts. Purchasing decisions, viewing decisions, and voting decisions are all demonstrating a distinct emphasis on image and image making. Coke is happiness. Nike is freedom. Apple is friendliness. BMW is the ultimate driving experience. ABS-CBN is in the service of the Filipino.

In the political milieu, imaging plays a stellar role. In the 2010 presidential derby, Noynoy Aquino was not alone — Hindi ka Nag-iisa — creating a bandwagon effect. Manny Villar was

Sipag at Tiyaga, championing the advocacy on entrepreneurship, where success could be had with industry and determination. Joseph Estrada remained Tapat sa Mahirap, a constituency he has been attached to all his political life. Gibo Teodoro represented Galing at Talino, latching onto his formidable academic and professional excellence, which made things achievable. Dick Gordon prided himself on being able to help every time there was a need, and captured the thought in Laging Gising Para Sa Bayan. Bro. Eddie Villanueva’s Tungo sa Bagong Pilipinas pictured him as an upright and forthright leader that would lead this country to change.

• Projecting a palatable public persona has always been important in political contests. In the context of present-day political campaigning, a clear image and unassailable reputation are invaluable. You and I live in an era where image takes on additional and critical importance. It covers how a person looks (youngish, athletic, respectable, “housewife-y,” authoritative or palaban), and how he or she is seen (veteran, or neophyte, accomplished or promising) and is being sold ( Manong, Tito or Tao).

• Media-savvy and public opinion-sensitive personalities are more mindful of what an effective image-marketing program can deliver. To them, it makes an obscure name famous, it builds reputation and creates public perceptions that bring heightened awareness and larger audience share. Some communications analysts compare a positive, high profile to a “lot of flash” — all bark and no bite, and where porma ( style) takes precedence over halaga or katuturan (substance). And of course, sometimes that’s all it is.

• A good image is the reflection of a good product. Those who deliberately tend and nurture a good image are often regarded as ominous or, at the very least, deserving of distrust from a suspecting public. But image marketing can be looked at differently. You can maintain the goodness of your image only if you are able to put together an integrated plan of action that will continually protect your positive equities, reverse negative associations, and develop new offerings that match your public’s cravings.

• When you have been able to build a great image, nurture it. The job of image making is anchored largely on how you manage perceptions. You create it if there is none. If there is a positive one, maintain it and take care of it as if your life depended on it. And, if haunted by a downbeat and negative one, change it. People’s perceptions are based on what they know — or what they think they know. Thus, it is critical to determine public insights, and make available a steady flow of information to raise levels of public recognition. From these insights and information, a strategic communications plan can be developed. Once a plan is agreed on among the parties involved, you must stick to it. Evaluate, tweak, calibrate or change if you may, but only for good reasons.

• Effective use of the available imaging tools will make a difference in your political

career. The challenge is on how you harness the avenues of awareness, how you efficiently utilize the identified touch points, how you evaluate your synchronized approach, and how you execute and deliver the defined key messages. Reaching your targets and making your presence felt take time, financial backing, and a formidable plan. And from a communications message and execution perspective, your program must carry the program elements of simplicity, imagery, repetition and sentiment.

Simplicity requires crafting key messages that connect with or are readily understood by the masses, while imagery needs clear pictorial or descriptive images that can evoke emotions and provoke actions. Repetition, on the other hand, entails the continuous propagation of selling propositions to push for collective consciousness, while sentiment calls for emotionled communications that exert a pull on a desired feeling: empathy, sympathy or support. A successful interplay of these fundamentals supports what political consultants says: that “to win every campaign, decide what you are going to say, decide how you are going to say it, and say it.”

• Image communication must deliver a “feel good” quality that triggers emotions. That’s the third principle. You may work on any or a combination of these emotions to make the appropriate linkage: approachability, trust, empowerment, familiarity, identification, curiosity, warmth, pride or relevance. It will likewise be helpful to recognize your desired poignancy transmitted through a smile, a hug, a handshake, a warm or sentimental feeling as you kiss a baby or embrace an elderly person. Getting a critical mass of people to consume a product, or to put a political candidate’s name on your ballot is difficult, but with the pertinent use of emotions, “buyability” or “winnability” comes much easier. Long after an image campaign has ended, the package has been thrown away, and the image marketing tools and resources have been brought down to a minimum, perceptions and images stay. You must protect these communications assets, and when a protection program is consistently put in place, these chattels can prove beneficial.

Whoever most vividly characterizes what a product or service is usually determines how others see it in their mind’s eye, feel it in their hearts, and act on it with great interest. Whoever dreams our dream gets our support. Such a person is an opportunity maker. Going beyond charisma, he makes things happen. He has an optimistic attitude and practices behaviors that inspire a happier and higher performance from others. He looks at people’s positive intent, especially when they appear to have none. He believes there are three ways to “be good.”

First, he brings out the better side of people he deals with so they instinctively see his own value. Second, he spirals up into cooperation and camaraderie rather than down into conflict and enmity. And third, he evokes the golden rule that can make dissimilarities — personal or professional — among his constituents a mutual benefit, rather than a cause for divergence.

• A good political brand persona creates opportunities. From this parallel, we can only hope that all those aspiring to political office will demonstrate their power to be good political brands and deliver clear platforms and intentions to the voters. A battery of questions can be asked of them. Start with, what is his single greatest asset as a political candidate? Is it his sterling record, servant leadership mindset, team play, productivity, charisma, empathy or individual intelligence? How does his persona reinforce his political brand?

• Image communication is seemingly a “flash” presentation. It can be just that if you allow it to be. But the more relevant and valuable practice is to go beyond the façade and project the brand or the person’s inner and deeper qualities with more vigor. Style is good, but when combined with substance, it becomes better. Sizzle invites, but the real fun is in the steak.

The Philippine presidential election process will go into full swing in the next few months, and political branding is once again going to play a major role in the way political communication is being used. We will be witnessing a battle of political brands. As records will show, most of them are expected to spend big bucks to buy advertising time and space to get themselves known, recalled, and preferred. Advertising is an expensive tool, but it is unquestionably a powerful implement in generating the desired result. There are those who use the supremacy of advertising early on, and there are others who procrastinate, only to play catch-up and join the fray in the last few week of the campaign period. But one thing is clear: no amount of good advertising can sell a bad product.

Style is good, but when combined with substance, it becomes better. Sizzle invites, but the real fun is in the steak.